The thoughts of an American Muslim and mother of four raising her children in small town USA with her Egyptian husband.

Tuesday, March 09, 2010

Now that sounds familiar...

I am at a seminar for early childhood teachers right now, Lifeways. It's Waldorf based if you haven't heard me say that 100x's already. Today we covered diversity, and a little analysis of how children come into their own ethnic identity through adolescence really struck a cord for me. "But why UmmLayla??? You're a white girl?" you say? Because I think that converts go through the same stages to some degree when they accept Islam. OK, maybe I'm crazy here... But I think you will see the similarity. It's like by accepting Islam puts you back to that struggle with identity that we all go through as a teen... What do you think? See if you agree:

Stage 1: Conformity Description: Preference for the values and norms of the dominant cultureStrong desire to assimilate into the dominate cultureNegative self-deprecating attitudes toward themselves and their racial groupAttitudes toward the dominant group are positiveDenial-How that applies to the convert: This is the stage when you first convert (so Islam will be the dominant culture here) and you are trying to fit in desperately. You do whatever you see the "Muslims" do because you think it must be right and good. This is the stage where you shop at the Arab markets even if you don't really know what to do with what you buy there. This is also the stage where you develop a negative attitude about the "kafir" and complain about your "kafir" relatives frequently. You also the reject input from more moderate Muslims assuming they are just being influenced by living in the land of the "kafir".

Stage 2: Dissonance Description: Individual begins to question pro-dominate culture attitude and behaviorsIndividuals alternate between self- and group-appreciation and deprecating attitudes and behaviorsConfusion-For converts this is a stage where you just might lose the whole converting thing. You have started to see that Muslims and Islam may very well be different things. But you still want to be a "good Muslim" by the standard of the community and are unsure about rebelling against the things you are starting to see as flaws in the fabric of Muslim culture.

Stage 3: Resistance and Immersion Description: Individuals embrace their own racial/ethnic group completelyBlind endorsement of one's group and all the values/attitudes attributed to the groupIndividuals accept racism and oppression as a realityRejection of the values and norms associated with the dominant groupEmpathic understanding and an overpowering ethnocentric bias-This is where you wake up one day and say to yourself... "Hey, I know I'm Muslim, but I happen to be (insert racial identity here) too!" You then commence eating copious amounts of the foods you grew up with for iftar unless you just feel like middle eastern food that night. Now, I'm not suggesting that this means you reject Islam... This is where you start to reject the culture surrounding it. You can now look at Islam vs Muslims, and probably by now you've decided that non-Muslims are not evil... Hey, you were one yourself. And oh yeah, it's totally OK to admit you miss x-mas and all the other things you grew up doing. But hey, it's all part of the personal struggle that is your deen, right? This is the stage where you may go to the extreme of deciding that all born Muslims have never really explored their deen and all they know is "Muslim culture".

Stage 4: Introspection Description: Individuals develop a security in their racial identity that allows questioning of rigid Resistance attitudesRe-direct anger/negativity toward dominant culture to exploration of individual and group identity issuesConflict between allegiance to one's own ethnic group and issues of personal autonomyIndividuals acknowledge there is variation amongst all groups of people-Getting to this one is a little harder, but I assert that many converts make it there because we are all working on ourselves (that's probably why we converted in the first place). This is where you leave your whole history and "Muslim culture" behind and try to forge a new you... The Muslim you. The person that is an amalgam of all the good parts you can glean from both worlds. There are bad days, because you see you aren't really a member of either group and you now need to form your own identity as an individual. You now see that hanging with other converts is no more a solution than avoiding born-Muslims, you find individuals you like in both groups.

Stage 5: Synergetic Articulation and Awareness Description: Characterized by a sense of self fulfillment with regard to racial identity, confident and secureDesire to eliminate all forms of oppressionHigh level of positive regard toward self and toward one's groupRespect and appreciation for other racial/cultural groupsOpenness to constructive elements of the dominant culture-This is the final stage... But it doesn't mean you can't go back to an earlier stage again later. Maybe you have a great experience and reach this for a short time... Maybe you are super-cool and you feel like this all the time. This is where you finally peel back all the layers of your original cultural identity and glean things you find useful from the "cultural Muslims". Now you can focus on the religion without getting caught in all the cultural aspects, internal and external.

11 comments:

ma sha Allah what a terrific post!I just laughed through it, it is soo true!

when i converted i first only met really extreme muslims in a kafir country, but they couldnt do other then complain on kufaar and haram here and there "hypocrites" much, so i started to be like that aswell.But then rediscovering my own culture "the halal parts" and enjoying them MORE as a muslim, and now i am confident in combining all aspects of culture to my personality, whether i feel a little bit hot north african or cold cool swedish :Pthis was extremly funny and well written ;)

I was a bit slow to convert so I had gone through some of these stages before converting, but for me the big culture/race hurdle was that I wanted to believe that culture could be removed from Islam altogether. It took me a while to appreciate things that are cultural that have no basis in Islam, as long as it doesn't go against Islam (remains "islamic" in at least this way). I imagined that since there were things my husband could not compromise on (Islam), I could change everything else about him! So with time, I learned that he is allowed to appreciate his culture and me mine, even if we are both Muslim.

Salaam ualaikum, I am so totally with you on this post :). It almost felt a combination between being back at about six or seven or so (in regards to religious education if you know what I mean), and on the other hand we encountered other Muslims who were shocked that we knew ahadiths and facts after we converted! Ah yes, the "I am Muslim, therefore I have to do as other Muslims do and shop at this "Muslim" store for the "Muslim spices, foods, etc." $75 later, and I get home and have no clue what zataar really is and how to use it (Other than those delicious smooshed biscuits). Now, I am an eclectic cook, much to my childrens' chagrin, but still...

Thanks for your thoughts, all of you! I'm glad this resonates with you, because after I posted it I wasn't sure that anyone else would get it! Well, that and I'm not sure anyone is even reading the blog these days!LOL

So, I'm happy that no one got offended and called me a kafir... Or maybe they did and just didn't post a comment!LOL Which is fine too.

I think this resonates with even "born Muslims", who weren't practicing and then started delving into the religion (in case you didn't get it, I am speaking about myself here.) Thought provoking and oh so true. Thanks for sharing!

Assalaamu alaikum!Sorry, I deleted my earlier post because I was rambling off topic. :)

But I wanted to let you know, Umm Layla, that a friend forwarded me this post through email because she thought it was so interesting - and I agree! I then forwarded it to another friend.

I agree with what you wrote. Although I'm mostly friends with converts...just happened that way. I do have a few Egyptian girlfriends whom I love and respect dearly, and mostly I met them through either family or my husband's friends. It can be hard to meet people in the different cultural groups, because they tend to often be *so tight* and just have that culture that they share, which gives them an automatic bond.

But as I've often said, upon reverting to Islam, it often takes some time to "calm down" after that. To find your Self inside Islam. Who you are and can be in that context, naturally, comfortably. It's a process of evolving discovery.

You often start off very rigid. For some, it's not necessarily because they want to BECOME that other cultural group; it may be, like in my case, that their experience with this new group may be the only way they as new converts know how to "do Islam."

Then you figure out along the way inshaAllah where you fit in - the old you, the new you, and hopefully, the better you. :)

About Me

I am a mother to four wonderful kids and the wife to one wonderful Egyptian! We live in a small town in the Midwest and work in our small businesses. I am also a Waldorf preschool teacher and childcare provider, a backyard chicken lady, a part time homeschooler, and a generally crunchy mama (think hijabi in birks).